The Nasdaq AD Line is not keeping pace with the Nasdaq Composite, but this is not bearish for the Nasdaq or the market as a whole. Note that the Nasdaq hit a new high in July and again on November 1st, even though the Nasdaq AD Line has been falling... READ MORE
The Biotech ETF (IBB) is making a bullish statement with recent developments in momentum, volume and trend. IBB is also outperforming its counter part, the Biotech SPDR (XBI), over the last two months. The chart below shows IBB surging around 10% from the early October low to the current high.... READ MORE
The market as a whole is not firing on all cylinders, but that is not really important. What, then, is important? We cannot expect a perfectly bullish stock market and rising tide that lifts all boats, as was the case in 2013 and 2017. Instead, we need to know which... READ MORE
Bullish continuation patterns are my favorite patterns when it comes to stocks and ETFs. As the name suggests, bullish continuation patterns, when confirmed, signal a continuation of the prior trend. Furthermore, because it is a "bullish" continuation, it means the prior trend was up and that trend is... READ MORE
The Industrials SPDR (XLI) and Finance SPDR (XLF) are two of the big six sectors in the S&P 500 and both are moving in the right direction: up. The Industrials sector accounts for 9.32% of the S&P 500, while the Finance sector accounts for 13.... READ MORE
While the S&P 500 and large-caps hold up well, small-caps and mid-caps continue to trade mixed. This suggest that the average stock is trading mixed, some up and some down. Even though we are not in a bear market environment, stock picking is challenging right now and we... READ MORE
The lack of new highs may seem like a concern, but one cannot talk about new highs without also looking at new lows because there are two sides to the story. The S&P 500 is within 2% of an all time high and there were just 28 new... READ MORE
The S&P 500 SPDR (SPY) hit a new high in July and then moved into a trading range the last few months. Momentum turned down during this trading range and this is perfectly normal during a consolidation. Today will look at a weekly chart pattern taking shape and... READ MORE
Today's report on StockCharts is short because the full report can be found at my new website, TrendInvestorPro.com. More details below. For now, I will leave you with the Core Emerging Markets ETF (IEMG) as its technical picture improves. The chart for IEMG looks similar to the... READ MORE
Follow Through Day or Not? Stocks started Friday with a bang as the S&P 500 SPDR (SPY) gapped above 296 and held this gap throughout the day, despite a sell off in the final 30 minutes. Does this count as a "follow through" day? It is... READ MORE
It is time for another round of weekend stock setups. Last weekend I featured seven semiconductor stocks and these are performing well. Two weeks ago I featured a hodgepodge of stocks with mixed results. The S&P 500 is trending higher, the Index and Sector Breadth Models are net... READ MORE
My assumptions and biases are based on the bigger trend because it is the dominant force at work. When the trend is up, I view the cup as half full and expect more bullish resolutions than bearish resolutions. This means I favor bullish setups over bearish setups, successful support tests... READ MORE
The goal of this commentary is to cut through the day-to-day noise and focus on price action that actually matters. Noise can be in the form of news or random price fluctuations. Either way, we are often better off when we filter the noise and focus on what really matters.... READ MORE
The S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 remain in good shape, the Russell 2000 remains in bad shape and the S&P MidCap 400 is caught in the middle. I am not going to read too much into relative and absolute weakness in small-caps because the Russell 2000... READ MORE
Semiconductors are holding up relatively well over the last few weeks. While many stocks and ETFs broke their August lows, the Semiconductor SPDR (XSD) held its August low and the Semiconductor ETF (SOXX) did not even test its August lows. Today we will compare and contrast the two ETFs and... READ MORE
Today we are going to show how 52-week highs and lows can be used to track long-term and short-term trends in the S&P 500. Full disclosure: this is not the holy grail. It is one indicator that can be used in conjunction with others to keep you on... READ MORE
We will start with the S&P 500 SPDR (SPY) and the S&P 500 EW ETF (RSP), two versions of the same 500 or so stocks. These are the most important benchmarks to watch when it comes to the broader market. As such, I will use these... READ MORE
Stocks in the Industrials and Finance sectors were hit especially hard on Tuesday with XLI and XLF falling more than 2%. The Technology and Consumer Discretionary sectors held up better than the broader market by falling less than 1%. Nevertheless, these four offensive sectors were down on the day. The... READ MORE
Several of the Sunday Setups were hit hard on Tuesday as selling pressure hit the Finance, Industrials and Materials sectors quite hard. Five of the eleven stocks came from these sectors (PFG, USB, HON, FAST and PKG). Nine of the Eleven are down over the last two days. KMX and... READ MORE
After running some scans, scrolling through the charts and filtering the setups, I came up with a dozen stocks to watch for next week, and perhaps beyond. All are above their rising 200-day SMAs and in uptrends of some sort. These stocks are also showing short-term relative strength. Eight of... READ MORE
Today I will expand and update the key breadth indicators for the S&P 500. Notably, I added two more early warning indicators to the mix. They have yet to trigger, but these added indicators will give us something to watch going forward. I will also update the charts... READ MORE
This weekly commentary, featuring the S&P 500, Index Breadth Model and Sector Breadth Model, is designed to provide an unbiased view of the current stock market environment. Models, while not perfect, provide a clear process driven approach for evaluating the market. Focusing on present signals, instead of future... READ MORE
Today's report will rank and group my core ETF universe from strong uptrends to clear downtrends. Most of these ETFs are stock ETFs, but I also include several bond-related ETFs and a few commodity ETFs in my universe. The defensive groups continue to dominate with consumer staples, utilities... READ MORE
My headlines are often inspired by tunes, and this one is a classic going back to 1936 and Fred Astaire. No, I am not old enough to have seen it live on TV, but I've heard plenty of remakes. Even though there may be trouble ahead, I am... READ MORE
Normally I ignore resistance levels in uptrends and support levels in downtrends. Resistance levels are not that important because higher highs are expected in an uptrend. The assumption is that a trend in motion stays in motion so a break above the prior peak is considered normal. Support levels, on... READ MORE
Mean-reversion signals provide a great way to trade in the direction of the bigger uptrend after a pullback. The trick is to identify the bigger uptrend and then capture mean-reversion setups. Mean-reversion setups materialize after a pullback within the uptrend. The strategy is based on the assumption that prices will... READ MORE
The resurgence of small-caps has been greatly exaggerated. Consider this. The S&P 500 SPDR (_SPY) bottomed on August 5th and broke above its August highs on September 5th. The Russell 2000 iShares (_IWM) bottomed on August 27th and broke above its August highs on September 10th. SPY bottomed... READ MORE
After studying the charts in my core ETF list, I came up with eight groupings. The top three groups represent ETFs that are still in uptrends, while the bottom three groups represent ETFs that are in downtrends and lagging overall. The middle groups are in flux. Group 4 represents ETFs... READ MORE
The S&P SmallCap iShares (IJR) and Russell 2000 iShares (IWM) are leading the market in September with 8.22% and 7.66% gains, respectively. As the PerfChart below shows, these gains are more than double the gains in the S&P 500 SPDR (SPY), Nasdaq 100 ETF... READ MORE
There are still plenty of strong uptrends out there in ETF land, but we are seeing a bit of rotation in the stock market. The Utilities SPDR (XLU), Real Estate SPDR (XLRE) and Consumer Staples SPDR (XLP) remain in uptrends, but they corrected the last six days as some out... READ MORE
Stocks surged the last 12 days with small-caps leading the way higher. The Russell 2000 iShares (IWM) is up 6.8% and the S&P 500 SPDR (SPY) is up 4.6%. Even though small-caps are leading short-term, they are still lagging on the three and six month timeframes.... READ MORE
It was a big week for stocks and the breadth indicators backed up the bullish price action. The S&P 500 SPDR (SPY) broke out of its August range to signal a continuation of the bigger uptrend. Even though the Index Breadth Model turned bearish in mid August, the... READ MORE
Major bullish reversal patterns signal the start of new up trends that can extend and be very profitable. However, chartists must first learn to distinguish between meaningful patterns and irrelevant patterns. Here's how... There are three parts to a major bullish reversal pattern. First, there is the price... READ MORE
Today we will rank and group the key ETFs that I follow. Instead of showing all five groups, like in last week's commentary, I will focus the middle three groups, which I think are the most interesting and still have potential. I am not even going to cover... READ MORE
The S&P 500 and SPY are challenging their August highs again and large-cap breadth is stronger than breadth in mid-caps and small-caps. Since we seem to be on a day-to-day situation with the S&P 500 and this trading range, I will provide another short-term breadth update.... READ MORE
Even though trend continuations are more likely than trend reversals, reversals do occur and chartists looking for price reversals should understand the classic patterns. While perusing through the charts today, I found a stock with a classic reversal pattern and a breakout in the works. Even though reversal patterns are... READ MORE
As noted in Tuesday's commentary, the S&P 500 SPDR (SPY) and several big sector SPDRs remain locked in trading ranges. SPY fell back from range resistance with a modest decline on Tuesday (-.58%). It certainly could have been worst. As the chart below shows, SPY... READ MORE
Stocks opened strong on Friday morning and then sold off ahead of a three day weekend. Well, the weekend has passed and stocks are set to open lower on Tuesday. What a surprise! August was volatile for the S&P 500. And yet it was also not volatile. The... READ MORE
Today we will look at charts for the biggest stocks in the Nasdaq 100 ETF. Even though the big tech titans dominate QQQ, note that Pepsi (PEP) is the 10th largest stock and accounts for 2.3%. PEP is obviously part of the Consumer Staples sector. The top five stocks... READ MORE
The broader market may not seem bullish right now, but there is clearly a bull market somewhere within stocks. In particular, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 are currently within five percent of all time highs, which were hit just five weeks ago. Moreover, they held well above... READ MORE